The last time an Australian bookseller tried to launch an eBook arm, it was Dymocks and it was a disaster – electronic books were more expensive than hardcover versions and the only eReader they were selling cost $900. Hopefully things have changed, with Blair Speedy at the Australian reporting that Redgroup retail, the company behind Borders and Angus & Robertson, are planning on selling eBooks.
The plan is to use Kobo, which will work across a number of devices, as well as selling cheap, $200 electronic readers. At the moment, they won’t say whether or not the eBooks will actually be cheaper than the paper versions – which is imperative if they want the standard to succeed (or even come close to threatening Amazon’s Kindle).
So while we’re still waiting to see where they go with pricing, at least we’re actually starting to see some progress here in Australia, especially considering we’ll be waiting a while after the iPad’s launch for the Apple Book Store…
[The Australian via Lifehacker]